This Is the Will of God
Salvation happens in a moment. The day you trusted Christ, you passed from death to life, and it can never be undone. Glorification will happen in a moment too, in the twinkling of an eye (1 Corinthians 15:52). Sanctification is what God does with everything in between.
Many Christians were never told there is an in between. They are saved, and they are waiting for Jesus to come. But salvation was the first page, not the last. God has told us plainly what He wants next: For this is the will of God, even your sanctification (1 Thessalonians 4:3).
Believers love the promise that all things work together for good to them that love God (Romans 8:28). The next verse says what the good is: that we would be conformed to the image of his Son (Romans 8:29). The good God is after is that you become like Jesus.
God's work of setting a believer apart for Himself. He places the believer in Christ at the moment of faith, makes him more like Christ throughout life by the Spirit through the Word, and makes him fully like Christ when He appears.
Positional sanctification is what God did the moment you believed. Practical sanctification is what He is doing in you now, with your full participation. Glorification is what He will do the day you see Christ. If regeneration is the birth, sanctification is the growing up.
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For Deeper Study
- Changed into His Image: God's Plan for Transforming Your LifeAmazon Jim BergA conservative biblical counselor who taught at BJU Seminary. A practical guide to lasting change from the inside out, with a companion workbook.
- Five Views on SanctificationAmazon Melvin E. Dieter and othersWesleyan, Reformed, Pentecostal, Keswick, and Augustinian-Dispensational writers each state their view and answer the others. John F. Walvoord writes the Dispensational chapter.
- He That Is SpiritualAmazon Lewis Sperry ChaferDispensational; the founder of Dallas Theological Seminary. A classic statement of the carnal and the spiritual believer. Read it knowing it leans toward the Keswick emphasis this article answers.
- No Quick Fix: Where Higher Life Theology Came From, What It Is, and Why It's HarmfulAmazon Andrew David NaselliA Reformed Baptist's careful history and critique of the Keswick movement.
- Foxe's Book of MartyrsAmazon John FoxeThe classic Protestant record of those who died for the faith, from the early church to the English Reformation.
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Justification
God declares the believing sinner righteous, forgiving all his sins and crediting to him the righteousness of Christ, on the ground of Christ's blood and through faith alone.
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